Game streaming is a technique of transmitting video game data from a first user device (e.g., “originating” or “source” device) running a video game application to a second user device (e.g., “game play” or “client” device”) to enable the user to play the video game using the second user device. For example, data of a video game may be streamed from a desktop computer to a smart phone, tablet, or other user device that has a touch screen (e.g., “touch device”) to enable the user to play the video game using the touch screen. Such video game streaming may enable a user to play a video game on a device for which the video game was not originally designed. For instance, game streaming may enable a game that was designed to be played on a video game console (e.g., a Microsoft Xbox®, a Sony PlayStation 4®, a Nintendo Switch®, etc.) using a game controller to be interacted with, and therefore played, by a user on a mobile device.
To permit a user to play a video game on a touch screen device that it was not designed for, a graphical overlay may be presented on the touch screen device. The graphical overlay provides touch screen controls that the user interacts with to play the game, providing a mapping of user interactions with touch controls of the touch device to the physical controls of the source device for the video game. For example, a video game may be designed for a video game console that a user interacts with using a handheld game controller. The video game may be streamed to a touch device, such as a smart phone. As such, a graphical overlay may be used on the touch device to present touch controls for user interaction. The touch screen controls (e.g., graphical buttons, etc.) map to the game controller controls (physical buttons, sticks, etc.). When a graphical overlay on a touch screen presents all of the game controller controls as touch controls, the touch screen can become cluttered, and may present touch controls in locations that block the user's view of the video game.